Bubble coral

[Gdbyrd]

My dad bought some bubble coral about 3 weeks ago, it's slowly been looking worse and worse. Anyhow. he asked me if I would want it since it looks like it's dying...see if it would do better in my tank(since everything I've ever put in my tank has lived aside from fish).

Is it a bad idea? I seem to remember them doing bad things when they died. How far to the brink can they go before it's too far for them to come back?

 

[bjohanson1234]

Anything dying in the tank can be bad. However, bubbles are pretty resilient and might come back. I would take it but keep a close eye on it.

Brian

 

[Gdbyrd]

Anything dying in the tank can be bad. However, bubbles are pretty resilient and might come back. I would take it but keep a close eye on it.

Brian

What's my best bet for being able to tell if it's going out completely? Just want to know when I might need to pull it. Thanks Brian

 

[bjohanson1234]

Does it look like it is melting away and falling off its skeleton? I have unfortunantly had a few of them do that to me. I am not sure if once they do, they can make it through that. I think my phosphates were to high, I was battling a hair algea outbreak and high phosphates can cause LPS's to detach from their skeleton. It didnt kill anything else in my tank, but I do try to keep up on water changes.

I also had one that got sucked up into the intake on a power head when I was moving my tank. Half the bubbles deflated. Within a few months it was back to its normal size. Then something else caused my tank to crash, power went out and caused my sump to flood, long story but not a good ending, lost quite a bit of stuff.

So it is really hard to say.

 

[Gdbyrd]

Honestly it looks like they're all just kinda shrinking up into the skeleton. It looks really bad though, lol. Should I do a smell test? If it stinks just let it go? Or will it smell anyway since some of it is dead?

The thing was pretty small to begin with, about the size of the palm of your hand. Slowly over a few weeks I've seen less and less bubbles inflating. Last I saw it was Wednesday and by then there were only like 5 inflated bubbles.

I'm going to try to talk him into babysitting his galaxia too as it's not looking too good either. I wasnted to buy that damn thing and he cut in line at the fish shop....I came home with NOTHING that day and he had like 3 corals. If we had taken my car he'd have walked that's all I'm sayin..

 

[dcantucson]

I would let it go.

 

[yote]

Try soaking the bubble in lugols iodine.It may just be unhappy,so I'd give it a shot.

 

[Melosu58]

The bubble coral I would try. Here is some info on it.

http://www.liveaquaria.com/product/prod_display.cfm?c=597+321+2048&pcatid=2048

 

[winyfrog]

I have found with lps corals if they are dying (starting to shrink away and not melting away) that you can usually save them. I would place it in a darker area in your tank will little flow. I have done this several times and they will alot of the time slowly come back it will take awhile so be patient. If it looks like its melting time to get it out.

 

[Bifferwine]

Bubbles are some of the toughest LPS corals out there. They seem to be able to bounce back from the brink of death with no problem. I'd dip it before putting it in your tank, and give it some time to regrow.

 

[Melosu58]

Just to show you a before and after pic of my bubble coral

11+ yrs ago

A month ago

As I said it`s over 11 yrs old and as Biff said they are very tough corals.

 

[dcantucson]

I had a large one that I had a long time, until my tank boil. It's especially sad to lose such a beautiful large coral. :(
I haven't been successful with them since.

 

[winyfrog]

Mike what is the species of that bubble? do you know its scientific?

 

[Melosu58]

Plerogyra sinuosa

http://www.liveaquaria.com/product/prod_display.cfm?c=597+321+2048&pcatid=2048

 

[Smitty]

I'd say give it a chance...lps corals are pretty hardy, they just need a little TLC. I've had my frogspawn and trumpets nearly dead, and pretty much had given up on them, but they came back to life and are starting to split now.

 

[dcantucson]

I guess I'm just too impatient. When my corals start dying I usually don't wait to toss them out!

 

[Kwater]

My bubble coral shrinks up in the Skelton a lot too. Don't know why but he is allesys fine the next day. Don't know if this has been adresed but they don't like a lot of water flow.